Not true, you lose morale and popularity by declaring war. I am not sure but maybe it does effect it a little. I am sure that it affects popularity when you attack into the province without declaring war. Perhaps there is a coding of the exact amount of percentage decrease for us to refer to. That will be sweet.

As far as doing it in general, I don't do it as I may need resources from the stock market and if a nation that I plan on going to war with has resources on the market, I want them. I for one rarely put resources up for sale. I just sell it when I need cash.

As far as doing it per some thread I read once that I reckon you are referring to as to help your GP, I experimented with it myself. This is what I found.

When I did this and waited the time before declaring war, it signaled to both AI Countries as well as active players that war was impending. This happened especially with AI Countries and then their troops started moving towards provinces near my boarder. Many times the AI Countries had unoccupied provinces next to me that I would be able to just move in and claim with out fighting for. When I did an embargo, I found the AI countries would then move troops into these unoccupied provinces and now I had to fight for it.

With this said, I have found what works best for me is making sure I always Declare before I attack. While I may not have the highest GP, it is never low enough to hurt me.

I meant whether the people who have the lowest GP successful in the game/map.

Ironically in my current game, at day 16, the two countries with the most VP's, they both have low GP's- including myself. The first 5 countries I went to war with, I was the aggressor- but I went thru the process of embargo and then declaring war. The next 4 countries that I went to war were all AI countries- which included the UK, who had gone inactive. I also have the largest army on the planet, supported by the top economy- large armies also seemingly lowering my popularity the last few games I played ...

I for one have only had one time that I was the lowest. That was right after COW switched to the Elite AI. I was playing Germany in 1939 Blitzkrieg. That was not a pretty site. As I did not know, I of course went after the AI countries all around me to improve my moral which would improve my economy.

Midway through the game, AI countries started to embargo me and quickly switched over to war. Soon I was at war with every AI Country out there. Good Fortune have it though, I was already to far ahead to be stopped and I won that game. But it did give me some valuable lessons and then I started experimenting myself.

Since then, I am never the lowest in GP. I am never the highest either. As I stated above, I never switch to a trade embargo before declaring war. I find no significant advantage to doing this. If anything, I find it as a disadvantage, especially against the Elite AI. With the experimenting I have done, I have found that as soon as you switch to a trade embargo against an AI Country you plan on invading, the AI starts moving their units around to your mutual boarders.

There has been a lot of chatter about changes needing to be made to the Elite AI and/or the Global Popularity. Here are my thoughts if anyone wants to know.

No changes are needed when it comes to Surprise Attacks. If you do it, then you should be penalized.

You should not suffer such a huge penalty as you do now when Declaring War against any nation including AI.

The more you play against the Elite AI, the better you will learn on how it reacts and how to counter it.

You should not have to place an embargo before declaring war against the AI. Refer to item 2 and this would not be an issue.

I for one believe there are many other more important things that need to be either fixed or changed than worrying about the Elite AI. As I stated in item 3, the more you play against the Elite AI, the better you will be against it.

I believe that when COW switched to elite AI, they only have it updated in newly created games. Not sure...@gusv never knew you speak French "mon general" Was either Français or short form of mono. Lol:)